Madrid, 2026-01-14 02:54:00
Alberto San Juan Deconstructs Spanish Identity in New Musical Play, “Male Screams”
The provocative theatrical work, running 90 minutes, blends comedy and music to dissect the past forces shaping Spanish masculinity and national identity.
- Alberto San Juan wrote, directs, and stars in “Male Screams,” a musical exploration of Spanish history and identity.
- The play questions the very definition of “Spanishness,” tracing its roots back to the 1492 colonization of Hispanic territories.
- San Juan describes the work as a personal reckoning with his country’s past and a search for a way beyond divisive “us vs. them” narratives.
- A band comprised of Claudio de Casas, Miguel Malla, Gabriel Marijuán, and Pablo Navarro accompanies San Juan on stage.
- “Male Screams” is a co-production of the National Classical Theater Company and EQM.
What dose it mean to be Spanish? That’s the central, unsettling question at the heart of “Male Screams,” the new play by alberto San Juan, a celebrated actor known for his Goya Awards for both Best Leading and Best Supporting roles. The production, a co-production of the National Classical Theater Company and EQM, doesn’t offer easy answers, rather launching a bracingly honest inquiry into the historical forces that have shaped Spanish identity-and the frequently enough-painful consequences of defining oneself against “the other.”
The National Classical Theater Company (CNTC) frames the play as a starting point from the myth of Don juan to discuss “the schizophrenic experience of being one of ours.” According to the CNTC, “Am I a man? Or do I only look like a man? Am I white? Or do I only look white? Am I European? Or do I only look European? The Castilian military victory in 1492 culminates the colonization of the Hispanic territory and the same process begins in America. Modernity begins with the tearing apart of the plural community that inhabited this territory into a “us”, the good, and an “other”, the bad, all condemned forever and ever.”
San Juan, also founder of the Animalario company and promoter of the Teatro del Barrio project, views “Male screams” as a deeply personal excavation. “It is a chronicle of my own blindness about the history of my country,” he explains. “A stammering attempt to approach the historical process by which the norm that establishes what it means to be spanish is constructed. An attempt to understand how the system of hierarchical power that governs us is constructed, how what is constructed macho -understood as the will to dominate-, in this territory called Spain. An attempt to identify who we are and who the others are, and why the war between both sides. The expression, perhaps, of the desire to overcome personal pronouns and lead to something that, without pain or shame, we can call life.”
The play unfolds as a comedy in musical format, with San Juan performing alongside Claudio de Casas on guitar, Miguel Malla on sax and keyboard, Gabriel Marijuán on drums, and Pablo Navarro on double bass. Lighting design is by Raúl Baena and Eduardo Vizuete, while San Juan himself is responsible for the costumes and scenery. Sergio Parra provide
